“What?”
The hood tilted slightly, let loose a flick of long silver hair.He hated old men with long hair.They always had a lecture ready.Zoos.Plastic.Inequality.Take your pick.
“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.”
The man’s words hung in the air, vibrating faintly, more command than scripture.The guy was using some kind of distorter device — trick-or-treaters’ kit, free with a box of Wheetos.
Brennan was angry now.“I don’t know who you think—”
“Again,” the voice rasped.“Recite.”
Something cold brushed his cheek.He looked down and saw the edge of steel, a knife perhaps, thin and gleaming in the light from the desk lamp.
“Remember the Sabbath day,” the figure repeated, each word clipped and perfect, “to keep it holy.”
Brennan’s heart hammered.He could see nothing inside the hood—no eyes, no face, only blackness.
He tried to run.
The light flared, white and searing.In its wake, sharp pain.One side, his left.Then the side of his neck.
And then, silence—save for the whisper of Bach, looping through the final aria, and the splashing of his blood on the carpet.
CHAPTER ONE
Sunday afternoons at Catherine Valentine’s townhouse had a rhythm, a ceremonial dance of habit and affection.It began with the chopping of herbs, the clink of the good china coming down from the high shelves.
Kate liked that sound — the domestic hubbub of her mother’s kitchen, augmented by the gentle, wheezing-snoring sounds of Sapir and Whorf, Professor Valentine's twin red setters, sleeping off their beach walk.
Even after she’d moved back to her own apartment downtown, Kate had promised herself that Sundays would stay sacred.No field reports, no crime-scene calls, no work laptop on the table.Just her mom and the dogs, smells of damp fur and roasting meat, and the stubbornly reassuring notion that some things in life could be normal.
“You didn’t invite him, did you?”
The question came not long after the first glass of white wine.Catherine tossed it in casually, with that deceptively mild tone that had made generations of undergraduates confess the holes in their theses.
Kate glanced up from the chopping board.“Who?”
“Michael, obviously.”
Kate sighed.“Mom…”
"Well, you said he was free today.That he wasn't working, it seemed logical."
“Logical doesn’t mean appropriate.”
Catherine pursed her lips, the international maternal gesture of censure.“I don’t see what would be inappropriate about inviting a nice man to Sunday lunch.You’ve been on, what, three dates now?”
“Four,” Kate corrected automatically, then regretted it.
Her mother’s eyebrows lifted.“Four?That sounds promising.”
“It’s not,” Kate said, chopping faster.The parsley began to look like confetti.“And before you start planning grandchildren, let me clarify that the last date ended with him telling me about a bookstore conference in Chicago and how little time he’s got for anything except work.”
“So?”
‘So if that’s not a barn-door-sized hint that he’s not interested, then I don’t know what is.”
Catherine reached for the olive oil and poured a thin stream into the pan.“I’ll tell you what I know.On the basis of once being married to a man, observing many examples of the species throughout my career,andbeing an expert in psycho-sociolinguistics…”
